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Loop Mobile's Launch of MOKO Music Re-defines the Mobile Music Experience

10 December, 2007 11:51

<p>Loop further widens the appeal of its award-winning MOKO mobile community offering and introduces a new way of consuming music</p><p>Sydney, 10 December 2007 - Loop Mobile Limited (ASX: LPM) today announced the global launch of its MOKO Music mobile community for music artists, music labels and fans. For the first time MOKO users will be able to communicate with their favourite music artist and music labels via their mobile phone. The inclusion of the MOKO Music platform will see the award-winning MOKO initially launch over 600 music artists from both major and independent labels, along with a host of amateur and unsigned artists to MOKO users globally. Each artist will have their own profiles and homepages, photo galleries, music audio and video file streaming, gig guides and fan lists. MOKO Music will be available to MOKO community users in Australia, United Kingdom and the United States across a range of on-net and off-net carriers.</p><p>"The launch of MOKO music and the further diversification of the MOKO mobile community offering is in direct response to current demand. Music is the most popular category that both interests our users and helps them identify themselves within the mobile community. With so many users associating themselves with their favourite artists we can see a definite move away from the traditional over air download of music to a more collaborative environment between artist and fan in a mobile music setting," outlined Mr Martin Hoffman, CEO and Managing Director for Loop Mobile Limited.</p><p>MOKO Music will be launched in Phase 1 Beta stage as part of its ongoing development plans. It will enable MOKO users to view, interact, and communicate with their favourite artists and their music through artist homepage profiles, users can add artists as friends, stream tracks and video, send private media messages, search for music, tracks, artists etc and even upload user-generated content such as tribute clips or fan art. Artists can even hold their own live chats directly with fans.</p><p>For Pete Carroll, the man behind Offworld Sounds, LittleBigMan Records, co- producer of Happy Monday's Shaun Ryder's solo album and manager of Australian band, The Panics the MOKO Music initiative is revolutionary. "Allowing the artist, their label and the fans to all interact from a single integrated mobile and web community is an important leap forward," said Mr Carroll.</p><p>"What Loop Mobile has created is unique globally. As someone who has been involved in the music industry for over 20 years, I believe that this platform will change things significantly. From The Panic's perspective, having a tool like this that can help drive communication between the band and their fans and enable the introduction of a new global audience via referrals within the community, is sensational."</p><p>Also introducing the MOKO website</p><p>The MOKO Music community will be available across the global MOKO network, both via its carrier partnerships and via mobile internet access. It is also planned to be available via the new MOKO website, which launches in the first quarter 2008.</p><p>The MOKO Community and MOKO Music services will be totally integrated from mobile to online, allowing users to interact with each other whether they access MOKO from the mobile handset or PC. Unlike many other web-based social networks that have attempted to produce a mobile version with reduced functionality, MOKO users can control, create and upload their content, together with hosting live text chat, from either platform.</p><p>At launch, MOKO Music will feature artists from music labels including Ministry of Sound, Road Runner Records, SonyBMG (Red Label) and Universal among many others. The artist list on launch will include a mix of Australian and international musicians ranging from Powderfinger, Jebediah, Grinspoon, The Panics and Architecture in Helsinki to 50 Cent, Amy Winehouse, Guns and Roses, Jack Johnson, Kanye West, Snow Patrol and Sonic Youth.</p><p>Existing MOKO users have already established fan clubs and nominated an initial 60 fan club presidents as part of its pre-launch MOKO user promotions.</p><p>"Our team has spent a lot of time consulting our users, ensuring that we can produce a more collaborative and community-focused mobile music offering. In effect our goal is to change the way that music and music related content, is consumed and allow our users and artists to be more in control and involved in either the consumption or promotion of music via the mobile handset or the PC. Both artists and fans now have greater collaboration with each other and the overwhelming initial support from our existing subscriber base reinforces MOKO Music's immediate popularity," Hoffman concluded.</p><p>Additional revenue will be generated from MOKO's subscription and user generated content activity from un-signed and independent artists who use MOKO Music to promote themselves.</p><p>Loop Mobile's MOKO community has today generated over 4.5 million MMS, over 76 million instant messages, over 3 million private messages and over 35 million video downloads. In the last 12 months the average user session time has more than doubled to reach 75 minutes per user session.</p><p>About Loop Mobile LimitedLoop Mobile Limited is an international provider of mobile communities, targeting the youth and young adult demographic. The company's flagship mobile community product, MOKO, is implemented across the 3 Mobile Australia, 3 Mobile United Kingdom, Virgin Mobile Australia and soon on Optus networks. It is also available worldwide via mobile internet at www.moko.mobi. Loop also provides white-label mobile community services to major brand and content owners. Loop was founded in 2004 in Perth and is today headquartered in Sydney. Its proprietary platforms enable the uploading and viewing of pictures and videos, personal profiles, live chat threads, private messaging, search facilities and additional features. Loop was the winner of the 2007 Best User Generated / Social Networking Service "MEFFY" international award by the Mobile Entertainment Forum for MOKO.www.loopmobilelimited.comFor media interviews or trial user of MOKO please contact:</p><p>Cathryn van der WaltEinsteinz Communications on behalf of Loop MobileTel: 0402 327 633E: cathrynvanderwalt@einsteinz.com.au</p>

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